Social media undergoes changes so rapidly that you blink and you will miss them. Since it is a digital marketing medium, every new bit of technology is an opportunity to upgrade the services and provide a more involved experience for its users. This said, it does get hard to keep track of the updates. Here is a primer:

Facebook

Facebook is trying to win the VR and the 360-degree photo race. It is one of the first social media apps to offer great support to 360-degree photos and videos. This feature is now available both on iOS and Android.

Facebook is also making it easier for its users to watch and save instant videos without the videos consuming a lot of data. These videos will be downloaded and cached while the user is on a Wi-Fi network and such pre-loaded videos can be then viewed with a mobile data plan.

A third update that Facebook is testing is the ‘snooze’ option. This is a gentler way of muting people and pages without actually unfollowing or unfriending.

Twitter

Twitter is famously doubling its 140 character limit to 280 in order to attract people to write more, tweet more and interact more. Another recent addition is ‘Popular Articles’ that will display all the articles your connections are tweeting about. Twitter has also tweaked its advanced search options to make it more business-friendly. Businesses can now search on the basis of people or hashtags and specific phrases while also excluding words and phrases.

Twitter is considering building the popular but dicey ‘tweetstorm’ into its app. With this feature, users interested in sending out a series of tweets can do so with more ease.

Instagram

Last year, Instagram introduced Snapchat-like stories. In June, they introduced the 24-hour video replay feature within these stories. This feature lets users share the story for another 24 hours. The stories are now seen on top of the feed on the desktop as well as on the mobile browser.

LinkedIn

In August, LinkedIn introduced videos, a new feature that encourages users to share and interact more about their work and personal interests. With this feature, users can upload a video resume, a product demonstration or even a speech or a presentation.

YouTube

Google has upgraded the YouTube app for iOS and users can now live stream on their iPad and iPhone screens. While live streaming, users can also employ the device’s microphone and front-facing camera to provide commentary or feedback.

YouTube is also looking to streamline its authenticity by restricting links to external videos. The new requirements for using end cards include being a member of the YouTube Partner Program and a total of 10,000 views or more.

Social media optimization

As far as social media is concerned, it is now clear that there is no uniformity. Every day brings new challenges and new upgrades. As a digital marketer, in order to optimize the advantages of the medium, it is vital to keep an eye on the changes and tweak your strategy as fast as you can to keep pace with the technology.

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